Albemarle & Bond in administration move

25 March 2014

The UK pawnbroker has filed a Notice of Intention (NOI) to appoint administrators today after it was unable to come to an agreement with lenders over alternative restructuring plans. Only yesterday it was reported shares were to be suspended after lenders confirmed they could not support the proposed restructure.

The company has struggled financially over the last couple of years with falling gold prices against growing debt. According to reports, Albemarle owes £50 million to its creditors, Barclays and Lloyds. They have rejected a restructure, therefore the company will soon fail to meet its liabilities.

Albemarle has said it wishes to appoint joint administrators from PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP.

As the company enters administration, there will be over 1000 jobs at risk across 230 stores. Creditors reportedly felt selling the business would not be a feasible option, however there aren't many options left now for the company.

UPDATE: Joint administrator, Mike Jarvis, of PwC has said "Our priority is to keep all pledged items safe and available for redemption as normal. We plan to sell all or part of the business to protect as many jobs as possible and we have already paid, or will be paying all staff - including accrued bonuses - as normal in March. Also, all landlords have been paid. However, some redundancies may be necessary depending on the outcome of efforts to sell the business. Every branch will initially remain open as sale discussions progress. This also enables customers to continue to redeem their goods as normal as they pay off their loans."

We are not involved in the administration and questions should be directed to PwC who are expected to be handling the administration.

Just a quick note to say a big thank you to all the staff at KSA, our CVA was passed today by creditors voting in an overwhelming number including HMRC to accept the proposal as prepared by KSA.

The road to reach today’s conclusion has been bumpy, but at each stage your team has supported and guided us through the issues and we have reached a very satisfactory outcome to the benefit of customers, staff, all creditors and shareholders.